Exam league tables
The learning process managed during the school years is designed to instigate learning and stimulate an individual’s further quest for knowledge. Exams are means of checking the performance process but unfortunately the original dual intention appears to have been lost. Knowledge has been overshadowed by performance and a tendency to “teach to test” to maximise exam results to achieve the ideal position in league tables.
Teachers are busy and stressed and the probability of a change in the system to broaden a child’s knowledge occurring in the short term is remote. Perhaps this is the point when parents need to step in and give their child some hands-on support at home. Broadening their understanding fuels a desire to learn more. Rather than just an exam result we can fuel broader based knowledge that will serve them better for the future.
Alistair Owens (The Guardian education blog) www.keen2learn.co.uk
